Apples
by NatD-LE
Summary: Nat relates a childhood story to Varric after finding an old photo in her mom's room, the only story about the Champion that Varric could never tell anyone. Fenris/F!Hawke.


**Disclaimer: I don't own Dragon Age or its characters.**

 **Third person to first person switch.**

 **Based on the conversation between Sebastian and Fenris that reveals that he likes apples, and my own headcanon as to how that love for apples came to be. Mostly a part of my own canon universe with my Hawke.**

 **Also, let's pretend that photos exist in this medeval universe.**

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"Thanks again for coming along to help me today, Varric." Nat smiled over the box she was packing to her good friend as he carried out an already-filled box from the room.

"Heh, no problem, Hawke. It's the least I could do." He grunted, carefully dropping the box outside in the hallway before returning to filling another box. She could see Orana moving that box downstairs. Her elven maid constantly seems to surprise her.

It's been years since Nat stepped foot in her mother's room. Since her death, Orana has stopped in only to dust, but she never had the heart to even look at that closed door. It was too much pain to bear. However, after chasing talking darkspawn and discovering more about her father's past, she decided it was time to comb through her mother's room and move some things to storage while selling others.

"So why is no one else helping you out? You didn't set this up just for some alone time with me, did you?" Varric grinned over at her.

"Aw, you caught me red-handed." She laughed and lifted her hands in the air, holding two red handkerchiefs with the Amell crest on them. She tossed them aside to be thrown out; those little scarves were a dime a dozen and she already saved that many. "No, Anders was swamped with clients and Merrill wanted to stay in to finish her mirror."

"That girl needs to get some fresh air. Remind me to nag her later." Varric grumbled.

"Will-do. Oh, and Fenris dragged Aveline to go find a slaver encampment he's been hearing rumors about."

"Another one?"

"No shortage of slavers trying to mess with Kirkwall, even after 5 or so years of getting their asses kicked."

"True, true. Where's Rivaini, then? You'd think she would never miss a chance to snoop." Varric chuckled at Nat's grimace.

"She wouldn't, trust me. But she said she had a date with a hangover at the Hanged Man. I told her we'd meet up once I was done here." Nat boxed up the last of the clothes in front of her and left the room to move them to her room.

Her room already had a ton of boxes meant to either go to Carver or be kept by her. Although keeping dead women's clothes was unethical to most, Nat could not deny that her mother had some good tastes in clothes that were conveniently her size.

When she returned to her mother's room, she found Varric flipping through a dusty photo album.

"It's so hard to imagine that you were this small at some point in your life. I mean, you barely went up to your mother's knee." He said without looking up.

"Were you any shorter when you were 5 years old?" Nat joked. He ignored her snide comment and kept flipping.

"Your father looks just like Carver, if he had a beard." He nodded appreciatively. "Looks like you had a little photo bomber here, though."

Curious, she walked over and kneeled beside Varric to see the photo he was looking at. Her father had his arm around Nat's younger self, her eyes wide with a smile that stretched across her face. Her mother was on the other side, her light hair framing her young face and a hint of her pregnant belly showing. But there in the corner, where Varric was pointing, was a little child just around her age and his mother just barely shown from the side. They seemed to be shopping at a stall and the child was carrying a basket.

She stared long and hard at that corner until Varric nudged her.

"You okay, Hawke? I didn't make you uncomfortable with these photos, did I?" He began to close the album, but Nat put a hand on his arm.

"No, you're fine. Just…" She sat down beside him and pointed to the picture. "I remember when this was taken. It was back in Lothering and my mother had asked me about it recently. I never knew there was a picture to go along with it." Varric stared at her for a moment before turning to face her and sat at attention.

"Well, you know me, Hawke. I'm always ready to listen to another story about the Champion." He smiled encouragingly. She thought for a moment and nodded.

"Sure, I'll tell you, but you have to promise me something."

"What's that?"

"You won't tell this story to anyone else. You won't include it in your other stories about me. This story goes with you to your grave. Okay?" Nat told him seriously.

"Oh. Sure, but… why?" Varric was surprised by the request. Although some of his stories embarrassed her, she never banned him from telling any of her stories, even though she always had a right to.

"You'll know why when I tell it to you." She said with certainty. Still confused, Varric nodded and sat quietly as she began to spin her own tale of a time long ago in Lothering…

There was a festival of sorts at the time where the market was full of people and stalls were set up everywhere. Mother was pregnant with the twins at the time and I was around 6 years old. My father decided to take the two of us into the market for some shopping. Due to the festival, lots of things were being sold cheap.

However, there were whispers among some of the Chantry sisters and the villagers. I didn't understand at the time, but I overheard one of the merchants tell my father that there were Imperium mages coming through Lothering. They apparently had business in Orlais and were stopping to rest in town for a day before continuing on with their journey. After hearing that, mother kept me very close while we shopped. There was also a larger number of templars in the main square, which made my father antsy but he tried to stay upbeat for me. I didn't notice any difference.

It wasn't long before I saw a whole new group of people running around the market. I noticed them because they wore robes that I had never seen before. They were darker than the Chantry robes I've been used to and had a dragon insignia on it. Behind them would be elves, dragging their feet in slightly tattered clothes, carrying several things at once as the robed men and women just passed everything on to them.

As a six year old, the strange robed people fascinated me for about 10 seconds before I noticed a stand selling some cool toys and tugged on my mother's dress to beg for her to buy one. She and father were trying to haggle down the price of a few bags of flour and potatoes, so she briefly forgot about the Tevinter foreigners and gave me a few silver to buy the toy myself.

As I skipped over to the stall, my eye wandered over to a stall that sold fruit. The vender was getting annoyed and impatient with his customer, who was a little boy that barely reached over the stall. He had short black hair that was so messy and thick that his pointed ears barely poked out of it. He was stretching out to hand the salesman what looked like a bronze coin but was different from the Ferelden currency. Being the curious snoop I was back then, I moved in closer to hear their conversation.

"Please can I buy some apples?" the boy asked, his voice thick with some accent that I had not heard before.

 _"He must have come here with the strange robed people."_ I thought

"Kid, I told yah, your weird little Imperium coin isn't enough to buy an apple. Now get lost already." the man barked at the boy. He shrank back with a sad frown, looking down at the coin as if there were something defective about it. I felt angry at that man's attitude. It wasn't right for someone to yell at a kid when they can't understand why they're being yelled at. As the dejected boy began to leave, I sprang into action.

"Wait a minute!" I cried. The boy stopped and turned to look at me in surprise. His eyes were so wide and green that they reminded me of the marbles I played with at home. Once I was sure he wouldn't walk away, I turned to the vender and held out my silver coins. "A basket of apples, please!"

The man's mood completely changed, politely putting apples into a basket and bidding me a nice day when I received my change.

"Thank you, and you might want to change that attitude of yours if you want more outsiders to visit you. Being a meany won't make you any money." I huffed at him, repeating what I once heard my father tell someone (of course, I didn't use any bad words like he did). Turning away from the stunned stall owner, I held out the basket of apples to the elven boy. "Here, for you."

He stared at me with those wide eyes, then down at the apples as he cautiously took them from me. Then, he said something quietly in another language.

"Huh? What did you say?" I frowned. He repeated it more loudly, which did not help. "Sorry, I don't understand." He frowned as well and seemed to struggle with finding the words he wanted.

"I… am grateful? For this?" He asked, looking uncertain of himself and gesturing at the apples.

"Oh! You mean, 'thank you'?"

"Y-yes! Thank you!" He nodded quickly, looking relieved now that we could understand each other. I smiled kindly.

"It was no trouble. Is this your first time in Lothering?"

"Yes. I came with master." He turned and pointed to one of the robed people off in the distance. I did not know at the time what he meant by 'master', so I assumed he was trying to say 'father' or 'mother'. I nodded in understanding.

"How long are you staying?"

"I leave in the evening." I frowned. That was so soon!

"Are you here for the festival?"

"No, master's business. I sorry." He frowned as well and turned to leave. I glanced over his shoulder and spotted a huge crowd cheering over the bridge to the Chantry. It gave me an idea.

"Wait! Do you wanna see the festival with me before you go?" I stopped him and asked. He blinked and looked down sheepishly.

"I dunno… master might not let me, and my momma is waiting…" He answered uncertainly. I glanced back at my own parents. They were still haggling, but they would probably miss me sooner or later.

"Don't worry, I know Lothering very well and would never get us lost! I'll get you back to the square before we're missed." I told him confidently. He eyed me silently for a moment, not buying it for a second. "Really! I promise!" I held out my pinkie to prove it. He stared at it and I thought he might not know what that means. "It's a pinkie promise. When we shake our little fingers, it means that I made a vow and it won't be broken." He nodded slowly and held out his little finger. I shook it and he began to look more excited.

"Okay! Where do we go?" He asked. I smiled and pointed to the party going on over the bridge. As we made our way there, I showed him more of the cool things the stalls had to offer, like toys and mabari collars and food from all over Ferelden. I went on and on about our pet mabari and the toys I have at home, because that's what you talk about when you're a small child and your life hasn't started being interesting yet.

When we were on the bridge, I turned to him and asked him about what he does at home. He clutched his basket of apples and picked at the straw on the handle as he described his home life. He helped his momma cook, he cleaned and served food to his master, and he would play outside with his twin sister very often as well. I didn't question the amount of chores that he had to do; maybe it was just a lifestyle for children in Tevinter.

We reached the party to find people dancing to a live singer. Men and women twirled around and laughed as they danced. I watched them in fascination, remembering the rare moments when father would dance with mother in the kitchen, and how she'd laugh and say how bad he was at it. He'd pick me up and dance with me too, although it's hard to dance when your feet don't touch the ground.

"Can we do that?" The boy asked me, pointing to the dancers.

"Yeah! Have you never danced before?" I tilted my head at him. He shook his head. "Then lets go!" He barely had a chance to put his basket down before I grabbed his hand and ran over to where everyone was dancing. We were kids, so our big dance steps were running around in a circle while holding hands and jumping around. Still, it was fun and lots of dancers stopped to coo over how cute we looked together. When the song ended, we ran back to make sure the basket of apples was safe. When he picked it up and we started to head back to the market to look at more stalls, someone suddenly snatched the basket from his hands.

"Well well, what a surprise to find you here. I wonder if your mother knows you wandered away so far." A shrill and slimy voice cackled behind us. I turned to see a teenage girl with brown hair and a cruel smile holding my friend's basket and looming over him. Meanwhile, the boy was frozen, his eyes wide and full of fear.

"Hey! That's his basket! Give it back!" I yelled at her, trying to grab it but she held it out of reach, laughing horribly.

"It's mine now, and so is he. Now scram, little Ferelden mutt." She grabbed the boy's wrist and began to drag him away. He looked back at me with regretful and defeated eyes. Not even the vender from before could've made me more furious than this person who dared hurt my new friend. I ran over and grabbed her wrist tightly. She stopped and turned her head to glare down at me.

"I said scram, you little brat. This is not your affair!" She tried to shake me off, but I kept my grip. A flare of anger bubbled in the pit of my stomach and I stared hard at her hand. It began to crystallize, ice coating every inch on the back of her hand and creeping to her fingers. She screamed and let go of the boy's hand as I let go of hers. The ice kept creeping until her whole hand was covered in ice. She clutched it to her chest and kept screaming. People began to take notice and even a templar or two began to walk over to see what the commotion was. I didn't stick around to see them. While she was distracted, I grabbed the boy's wrist in one hand, apple basket that she dropped as well in the other, and I ran into the nearest alleyway.

The best part of Lothering was the short system of alleys connecting every street. I weaved and ducked into a few until I came to one closest to the market but still out of sight. I finally let go of the boy's arm and tried to catch my breath. I finally looked up to smile at him, but it died when I saw the fear on his face.

"You okay? She's gone now, so you don't have to be afraid. I have the apples too, see?" I held up the basket, but he didn't notice. He kept staring at me.

"You… you're a magister?"

"A what?" I frowned at the way he used the word, like it was a bad one.

"A magister! You use magic! That thing you did to Ha- her hand-" His voice died down and he shrank away from me, starting to mutter in his native language. His eyes filled with tears.

"Hey, what's wrong? I'm sorry if I scared you."

"Please don't hurt me." he whimpered. The words made me ache.

"Hurt you? I wouldn't hurt you! You're my friend and I never hurt my friends." He started to really cry and kneel against the wall. I kneeled beside him and put my arm around his shoulders, like father would when I cried. He was shaking a little. "I'm sorry I made you cry. I thought she was hurting you. I just wanted to help." I tried not to cry myself, but my eyes stung a little when I saw how sad he looked.

After a moment of sniffling, he finally looked up at me.

"You… really won't hurt me?"

"No. Why do you think that?"

"Because everyone who uses magic uses it to hurt people. My momma was burned lots of times and there are terrible stories of my people disappearing because of magic." He looked away. "I don't like magic very much."

"Well, my father and I aren't mean like those people. My father always taught me to use my magic for good things, like helping people." I stated proudly, as I always do when talking about my father. "I mean, I don't know many people who use magic because we're not allowed to use it in public, but I think that it depends on the person whether or not they use it to hurt people. Those magister people don't seem like good people."

"They're very bad, and scary." He agreed.

"Do you think I'm a bad person? After I bought you apples, took you dancing, and froze the mean girl's hand?" I nudged him, trying to make him smile. He did, but only a little.

"No. I've never had someone who would freeze someone's hand to help me."

"See? So, are we friends again?" I asked him. He looked at me for a moment and smiled a nice wide smile, wider than I had seen all day.

"Yeah, we're friends." I grinned back at him and we both stood back up. He grabbed the apple basket. "I should go back to my momma. She won't be happy to hear what happened."

"Well, I promised to get you back before they noticed and I will." I took his other hand to lead him through the alley and out to the market. He and I began to search for our mothers when I remembered something.

"Oh! I don't think I asked for your name."

"Oh yeah! I don't know yours either."

Just as I was about to say it, I heard two voiced cry out from the crowd.

"Leeetooo!" The boy snapped to attention and looked around.

"There's my momma!" He pointed to a thin elven woman walking around with a young girl at her heels. She had black hair with pretty silver streaks in it and she wore the same tattered clothes that all the elves have worn. The little girl looked strikingly like the boy, only her hair was longer. The girl noticed her brother first.

"Hey Leto! There you are!" She ran over, staring between us and at our clasped hands. "Where have you been? Hadriana ran back yelling about her hand being frozen."

The boy, Leto, blushed. He tried to stammer out an explanation while his sister looked on critically. Their mom made her way over, looking relieved. I decided to come to his rescue.

"I'm sorry if I worried you, Leto's momma. I was just showing him the festival. I hope that was okay." I smiled kindly. The sister gave the same look of scrutiny that Leto gave me when I first bought the apples, but the momma smiled kindly back at me.

"Thank you for bringing him back safely, then. What is your name?"

"Oh, I am–"

"Nataline!" I jumped at my name and looked back to see my father running over to me, brow furrowed. "There you are. Your mother and I turn our backs for one moment and you're gone."

"Sorry, papa. I was just showing my new friend the festival." I gestured to Leto, who looked sheepish when my father looked at him.

"I'm sorry if we were any trouble, ser. We'll take our leave now." The momma suddenly stammered, bowing. My father put a hand up with a small smile.

"No trouble at all. It looks like we both had our hands full with our children running amuck." He looked at me accusingly, but had a slight twinkle in his eye that made me smile. He kneeled down before us and looked at Leto. "What's your name?"

"L-Leto." He squeaked, looking slightly intimated.

"Nice to meet you. Did you enjoy seeing Lothering with my daughter?" Leto nodded and my father smiled. "Good. I'm glad to see my daughter making friends." He held out his hand to shake Leto's. My fathers hand swallowed it completely.

"Well, darling, we must be going or we'll be missed. Again, sorry for the trouble messere." Leto's momma apologized. My father shook his head and said it was no trouble. Leto and I frowned that we had to go our separate ways.

"Will I see you again? You'll come back to Lothering, won't you?" I pouted. I was sad that one of my friends had to leave me so soon. He smiled and held out his pinkie, to my surprise.

"I pinkie promise that we will see each other again, Nataline." I smiled and linked my finger with his before dashing forward and giving him a big hug good-bye. His momma took his hand and led him away, the apples in his other hand. I saw him give them to his momma as a gift before he smiled back at me. I waved back at him vigorously. I could hear his sister start to chant 'Letos got a girlfriend' as they walked away.

My father put a hand on my shoulder and whispered, "we should probably not mention this to your mother. What do you say?"

"That's probably a good idea." I agreed. He laughed and walked me back.

"Mother was furious, of course, but she never knew about what happened. Father decided to take the picture with the festival in the background and I guess, somehow, he made his way into the photo." Nat ended her story, her finger tracing the edges of the photo. "She brought it up before she died, asking me if I remembered the time I disappeared for ages during a festival in Lothering. I still didn't tell her what had happened."

Varric sat there, staring at her silently for the entire story. "So… that elf boy you met… he couldn't have been…" Nat didn't say anything as the dwarf tried to gather his thoughts. "You're pulling my leg."

"Can't make up stuff this weird, Varric. I'm not the storyteller." she joked weakly.

"Good point. Wow." He huffed out a stunned breath. "How long have you suspected?"

"Since Hadriana. I sort of recognized her." she quietly admitted.

"What you did to her corpse was poetic justice, then?"

"I suppose. I didn't know for sure until Varania, when she called him by his real name." There was another long silence.

"Well!" Varric huffed, laughing a little. "Isabela and I always joked about you two being soul mates, but this… I mean… are you sure that…?"

"Of course I'm not sure. Hell, it could be a giant coincidence for all I know, but i honestly doubt it because that's just how my life works." Nat groaned and rubbed her forehead.

"And I'm guessing you haven't told him."

"No, I haven't." Varric nodded in understanding.

"Well, don't worry, I won't be the one to spill the beans. If you want this story to be told from your mouth, I'll respect tha-"

"I'm never going to tell him, Varric." The dwarf blinked.

"Really? Why not?" He asked, frowning. "This is huge news! It's a piece of Fenris's past that you, of all people, know about."

"I know that! But…" She sighed and leaned back against the wall. "The boy that I knew as Leto is not the same man that I know and love today. He told me himself, whoever he was back then may as well have never existed. I do not want to open that can of worms until I know he wants to. Leto may have been my friend at some point, but he died at the hands of his master long ago and has been avenged a few weeks back. I fell in love with Fenris because of who he is now and the kind of friend he has been for me presently, not because he used to be my friend way back when."

Varric nodded slowly. "I can respect that too. Thank you for telling me this story, Hawke. I'm glad to be your secret keeper." Nat smiled at him.

"Thank you, Varric. It means a lot." He gave her a one-armed hug as they heard the door downstairs slam and Aveline ranting as she stomped her way in.

"If I see another dragon sigal, I swear I'm going to go ape-shit!" They heard her yell. Fenris's chuckle followed.

"Well, guess you'll be entertaining for the rest of the day." Varric chuckled.

"Thank the Maker. I needed a break." They stood and made their way to the main parlor. Orana served glasses of wine while the four of them sat around and listened to Aveline rant about the mass of slavers thinking they could just loiter in Kirkwall like nobody's business. In the middle of her speech, Nat got up and leaned in to Fen to ask if he was hungry.

"I could go for something sweet. An apple, maybe?" She had to laugh a little.

"I figured you'd say something like that."

"Why?" He eyed her suspiciously. She shrugged.

"I dunno. Girlfriend's intuition, perhaps."

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 **Reviews are greatly appreciated to help me become a better writer!**


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